It's Like a Knife in a Gunfight
by SingleMinded
Summary: After an undercover gone wrong, this is how Hank Voight says sorry after feeling guilty towards an injured Halstead. But it leads to a revelation of a big secret. It is more Voight as father figure than a leader. Warning : A mention of child abuse.
1. Chapter 1

**Summary:** After an undercover gone wrong, this is how Hank Voight says sorry after feeling guilty towards an injured Halstead. But it leads to a revelation of a bigger secret. Totally Halstead and Voight. It is more Voight as father figure than a leader.

 **Warning** : A mention of child abuse.

 **Author's Note :** This is going to be a two parted story. And it's probably AU because Erin is gone more than three weeks. This probably will never happened in the real show. For your info, this is my first time writing a CPD story because of the stupid plot bunnies. I also didn't use any beta reader so all mistakes are mine. Please noted that English is not my first language.

 **Disclaimer :** CPD and its characters belong to NBC and the production team. As usual, the title is from Jamestown Story's song.

* * *

 **It's Like a Knife in a Gunfight**

 **Chapter 1**

by SingleMinded

It was an idle day without a case and Hank Voight was taking his leisure time wrapping up some paperwork including the one where he was one man down for at least five weeks – or else, he would never get any replacement for Jay Halstead.

He was about to pen down his signature to the last page when Antonio Dawson's head appeared behind the glass wall after a soft knock.

"Sarge, can I take off earlier? I need to pick up Halstead from the hospital."

The upper ranked officer's brows grew together as he glanced up to the detective. "And why in the world do you need to pick him up today? I thought he needs to stay for at least another three days?" It was a question but he thought he knew the answer beforehand.

"By the way, his brother can take care of him." With that statement, he continued his work, dismissing the detective.

"Will asked me to pick Jay up because he discharged himself about an hour ago but Will is still on duty. He said Jay is in no state to get home by himself. It's either me pick him up or we will found him dead on his way up to their apartment." Antonio said.

Voight looked up, staring at him in disbelieve.

"His words, not mine." The detective shrugged, without any hint of guilt.

The Sergeant scratched his not-so-itchy jaw, looking a little deep in thought. Antonio fidgeted, starting to lose his patience while waiting for his approval.

After like a minute, Voight stood up while hands were fixing up the papers in front of him into a folder. He moved past Antonio, grabbing his jacket behind the door.

"I'll go"

Antonio blinked, staring dumbfounded to his superior – making sure his hearing was not wrong.

"You… what?"

"I said I'll go." With that, he stepped out of the room, aiming for the stairs.

"Hey Sarge!" Antonio's loud call halted him on the first step of the stairs. He moved around, waiting for the guy to reach him.

The Hispanic man approached him silently while glancing to his side – aware of a couple set of eyes from Ruzek and Olinsky who were accompanying their scene suspiciously.

He cleared his throat, feeling awkward out of nowhere. "Jay just do his job, so do you. It's not your fault that he got injured."

Reflexively, Voight pulled his gaze from meeting the eyes before him. His jaw set in annoyance of getting caught before putting his foot back to the next step – walking away without any disagreement.

...

"Voight, thank you for being here. I'm sorry, I thought Tony or at least Ruzek can help me but when he called back telling me that you…" a breathless Will Halstead greeted him at the floor lobby.

"Hey kid, don't worry about it. It's fine." Voight flashed a small smile, trying to calm down the young doctor who obviously felt uncomfortable upon receiving his help. He seemed a little restless, probably because of running up here from the ER – as the sweat was still visible on his forehead.

They walked side by side to the orthopedic wing.

"Today is a little busy down there. I asked him to wait for me to finish my shift but instead, the stubborn brother of mine thought that it's the best decision to wait for a cab at the bus stop. I found him winded at the nurse station. I just don't want him to hurt himself further, that's why I need someone to take him home." Will held the door for the older guy to step inside the Unit.

"So he really good to go?" Voight voiced out his doubt, his sight was eyeing the room number one by one as they passed the doors until they reached 318's.

"Not really. He can move around but with a strict bed rest for at least two weeks."

They walked into the room, just to find Jay sitting at the edge of his bed – right arm on a blue sling, cuts and bruises were visible on his face and behind the grey shirt, they knew that the ribs were heavily wrapped with bandages as three of them were broken.

Jay stopped playing with his stitches on his left eyebrow, looking up to welcome his guest. But he was left agape at the sight of his boss. His eyes wildly searching for another figure beside his brother and Voight – no Antonio in view.

"How are you doing, kid?" the greeting sounded unusually nice.

Jay offered a small smile, thinking that this was the first time Voight paying him a visit since his admittance to the hospital – the second time if taking him to the ER and staying for the first night counted. He was still unsure about the memory since he was dazed in and out after being beaten like a pulp on their last case – especially when the superior was no longer present at the hospital after that – but when Will told him the story, it was hard not to believe.

"Well, good enough. Thank you for dropping by Sarge, but I'm going home. Actually, I'm waiting for Tony, he should be here in a few minutes."

"Well, he won't. Let's go then." Voight grabbed the duffle bag from the bed while Will Halstead was pulling a wheelchair that was already there and setting it up in front of his brother.

Without a word, to Will's surprise, Jay was sitting slowly onto the wheelchair – when he was pretty sure the wheelchair was an argument worthy to his brother. But now, he was pushing the younger man silently to the main door.

 _That must be the influence of Voight._

He thought as he looked at the older man who walked along by their side. But even though everything went smoothly, he couldn't help but noticed the troubled face of his brother – as if he was so deep in thought – as they reached Voight's car. Carefully, he helped Jay to get into the car and sitting comfortably on the passenger's side.

"Take care Jay, I'll be home first thing tomorrow morning." He patted Jay's back a few times before closing the passenger's door.

"Thank you so much Voight. Oh, and this is the key to the apartment." Will was holding up a bundle of keys to Voight when the old detective just chuckled.

"I'm taking him to my house. Just make sure to fetch him back tomorrow."

"Oh. Okay then." Will nodded. He found himself speechless, but at the same time feeling so grateful to learn that his brother was not going to be alone tonight. He never got the time to know more about Hank Voight but from what he heard – obviously from his brother – Jay and Voight were not really in the same clique. He also never knew how Hank Voight really treated his brother at work but he saw something different about him tonight, something that put him in utter respect for the leader.

...

 _He tried to push himself up, leaning heavily against the wall for some support. The copper taste inside his mouth were making him sick – or maybe the sick feeling was resulted by the ache all over his body. He heard the guys talking around him.  
_

 _"You think you're clever enough? Huh?!"_

 _61…_

 _He felt his body tensed as another kick reached his torso – he could even heard the crack this time. He doubled over but another kick sent him back, hitting the wall hard. He coughed up blood, not sure where it was coming from – either it was from the cut inside his cheek or from inside his own body – and he didn't care anymore. Like a slow motion cut in the movie, he could feel his body lost its balance and met the pavement with a thud._

 _62… 63…_

 _He received two more kicks on his back – grunting silently in the middle of the night. His right cheek felt numb on the hard surface and he could only see the black spots in front of his eyes._

 _Suddenly, he heard the distant siren along with a mass noises around him._

 _He could feel a pair of strong hands carefully trying to turn him around._

" _Hey Halstead. Come on kid, wake up."_

"… _wake up…."_

 _..._

"… wake up. We're here."

He woke up with a jolt, regretting it shortly after he did. His face contorted in pain as his left hand was holding his bandaged ribs lightly.

As soon as he went pass the pain, he looked around confusedly, ignoring the strong frame hovering over his side of the opened passenger's door.

"It's your house," Jay said softly and it sounded dumb enough to receive a smirk from his boss.

"Yeah, and you're staying here tonight. Come on kid, let set you down so you can rest." Voight said, as he moved aside, waiting for the struggled Halstead to get out of the car.

The young man was about to argue but as the exhaustion took over, he gave up.

They walked inside the house in silent. He had been there only three times – every single time with Erin and never alone like this. As soon as he stepped inside, Jay felt so awkward. Never in his mind it occurred to him that Hank Voight would welcome him to his home like tonight. Looking at the ray of family pictures – Voight, his late wife, Erin, Justin and some with Justin's new family – he couldn't help but feeling like an intruder to a personal secret.

Erin didn't talk much about her life with Voight before so the less information he knew about the family just spiced the sentiment more.

Voight cleared his throat, sensing the troubled mind of the young man. "You can use Justin's room. I'll fix us some dinner." He gestured the room at the end of the hallway while his eyes were gazing to the duffel bag slung on Jay's uninjured arm.

"Need some help with that?"

"Nah. I'm good. Thanks Sarge." He smiled slightly. Voight nodded before they parted away in the middle of the hallway – Jay to Justin's room while Voight to the kitchen.

The room was a typical boy's room – Cubs' related items were hang everywhere also some photos of cars and a few celebrities. He could see that Voight was taking care the room neatly, as if his son was never left for army. A part of the wall also filled with family pictures – Erin included.

He lifted up his head looking at the wall for far too long when a pang of dizziness swayed him a little to the left. Didn't want to risk a humiliation of being found passing out on the floor, he slowly sat at the edge of the bed.

The dizziness didn't go away though. So he decided to lay down a bit – closing his eyes maybe for a minute.

 _Just a minute._

 _..._

 _36… 37… 38…_

 _The violent kicks kept coming. From his left, his right, even at his back. His right arm felt so numb of shielding too much hits. He was pretty sure if it wasn't broken already, it must had been badly fractured because its muscles couldn't defend the bone anymore._

 _39… 40…_

" _Stop…" A grunt. He managed only a grunt. His crackled breath quickened._

 _41… 42… 43…_

" _Stop!" He thought he screamed it out – but maybe it was just inside his head because he didn't hear a thing from his own lips. He knew he couldn't stop the man from beating him but he just wanted to stop the ticking inside his head._

 _44… 45…_

 _45 beatings in nine minutes. 5 hits in a minute. Not much but why it hurts like hell?_

" _Arghhhh….." Another grunt escaped. His brain choose a bad time to be too mathematical analytic._

 _He managed to look up just in time to see an ugly black boot sole in front of his face._

 _He cringed._

" _Dad… NO!"_

 **TBC**

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Pheww... So how about a review :) Thank you for reading. I'll update in a few days. Maybe if I'm encouraged enough, I'll update tomorrow.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary:** After an undercover gone wrong, this is how Hank Voight says sorry after feeling guilty towards an injured Halstead. But it leads to a revelation of a big secret. It is more Voight as father figure than a leader.

 **Warning** : A mention of child abuse.

 **Author's Note 1:** I just want to thank all of you who follows and reviewed this story. For Lala, LaFrancaise, anon Guest and V Hugo (I'm not French but I use google translator) how much I wish to reply to you guys personally but still thank you.

 **Author's Note 2:** So here's the thing, because you guys love the first chapter so much, I'm afraid if this chapter is not going to meet your expectation. I can't make this better than first chapter and I always have something to change everytime I read it again and again so maybe I'll regret this tomorrow but here you go. I don't have beta reader. I also don't speak English much so all mistakes are mine.

 **Disclaimer :** CPD and its characters belong to NBC and the production team. I don't have any medical background so this mostly based on my own simple research. As usual, the title is from Jamestown Story's song.

* * *

 **It's Like a Knife in a Gunfight**

 **Chapter 2**

by SingleMinded

Small taps on his cheek woke him up with a jolt – for the second times in a row that night.

He gasped a few times, trying to catch his breath as he blinked at the concern eyes before him. But the heave didn't stop and he started to feel alarm.

 _Why can't I breathe?_

"Hey, kid. Hey. Hey! JAY! Look at me!" Voight's hands clutched each side of his face, demanding Jay's attention. But it seemed like a lost cause, as the younger guy's mind appeared to have another idea – to get away from him.

Jay's left hand grabbed Voight's arm, trying to pry it opened from his face. The gasps became worse as Voight could clearly see the panic in the eyes when the kid's exhausted body couldn't fight the strong present of the sergeant.

He gave a gentle slap to get the attention back.

"Jay, look at me. You can breathe. Look at me." Jay kept looking away. "Hey." He pulled the trembled chin to lead the head toward him.

"Trust me on this. Just follow my breathing." He waited until Jay's eyes fixed on him before he slowly guided him to a proper breathing.

"Deep breath. In and out. Good… good… just like that."

Jay started to calm himself down. That was when he began to get his senses back – a clear picture of his whole situation right now. His brain got to function again and he couldn't help but feeling so embarrassed.

 _Damn! Damn it! Why now?_

He felt like burying himself alive.

Post army days, he had never been this vulnerable in front of anybody – neither Will, nor Erin. And to be this weak in front of Hank Voight to begin with, it was so wrong in so many ways.

Voight straightened up his posture when he was certain that Jay was no longer in the harm of the panic attack. But still, he left his right hand to clutch Jay's uninjured shoulder – leaving comprehension of support. He took a closer look before letting go a long sigh of relief as he could see the colour was back to the previous pale face.

"You okay?" A short question – also replied by a short nod.

Voight felt that Jay was shifting back a little – a move that would go unnoticed if not because of his clenched hand on the shoulder that suddenly lost some of its grip. Bending up one of the knees a little, Jay's head bowed down while his left hand unconsciously roaming over his sling. Voight furrowed his brows as he noticed the behavior.

The kid was in a defensive mode. And it confused him.

Jay was a trained soldier. He could pull a stoic face without emotion in a couple of second if he needed to. He saw that a few times before. But now – under an offhanded pressure – the young man gave away every single hint possible to be read by him with his body language and facial expression – his bare emotion.

Hank Voight stood there silently, trying to put two and two together. It didn't take too much time before it hit him.

"The nightmare, this… this panic attack, it is not the first time?" he asked, only to be responded with a mute answer.

"This is not the first time then." He said slowly, confirming the answer himself. His jaw set, gritting his teeth together.

 _Surprise. Sympathy. Stupid._

The surge of emotions rushed inside his chest for just getting to learn this now. And somehow these emotions grew to an unnecessary rage.

"Do you have some sort of PTSD that you failed to tell me beforehand? Are you that stupid to receive task after task to be in a dangerous situation with a criminal before, without noticing me of your problem? What if this happened when we pursue a suspect or in a gunfight?!" He roared but then mentally scolded himself as he saw Halstead just flinched under his blow.

He shook his head, running down a hand through his face. He didn't have the right to blame Jay for something uncertain yet because he needed to at least hear the whole story from Jay first.

It was enough that he felt guilty as hell after getting this subordinate injured. Now, he didn't need to put more blame to the kid for something he couldn't even control.

He crouched down, leveling their eye contact – which was impossible right now because Jay just looked down, playing with the sewing of his blue sling. A pang of regret streamed down his chest as he looked at Jay's face. Instinctively, he ran his right hand to the boy's head – like he always did to Justin.

"Come on, dinner is ready. You need to take your med anyway. We can talk about this another time."

…

They sat silently on the table. As much as his stomach growled, asking to be fed, his appetite just didn't feel like it. Jay managed to finish half of his pair of sandwiches before he thought it was enough to take his medicines. His body was clad in a thin grey shirt and it wasn't really cold around here but still, his hand trembled as he popped the pills into his mouth – in full hope that Voight would never notice it.

After that he sat there motionless, waiting patiently for the effect of the drugs. Two of the pills was the drowsy pills – the painkiller – and it should be enough to slow down his pounding heart which started to rise up again.

 _Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop._

He hated it when he couldn't control his body like it wasn't his. He knew how to pretend – like what he usually did as if he was a master of it. He could cover the trembling hand under the table, he could obviously wrapped up the sound of his thumping heart inside his chest but he couldn't hide his fast breathing – and it troubled him – because when he tried, he just make it ragged and visible to Voight's hearing distant.

This stupid panic attack – he had a clean record for the whole year – he thought it was gone. Because once it started, it wouldn't go away easily. To have this problem shared with his boss was not even an option. So he could just pray for the drug to take effect as fast as it could – because if it wasn't, he rather ran away from this house than having the embarrassing moment in front of Voight again.

"Jay."

He opened his eyes – which he never realized that he closed them before – looking straight at the brown eyes in front of his.

 _He noticed._

Jay thought, judging from the concern eyes of the old man. But his ragged breathing started to slow down and the hard thumping inside his chest was no longer sensed. He started to feel drowsy.

Finally the drugs kicked in.

"You okay?" Voight looked at him. Jay couldn't help but finding so small under the scrutiny of his boss' eyes – feeling naked of being read like an opened book.

"Yeah." He nodded, looking away. He didn't have any courage to meet the eyes anymore.

Courage.

He needed to find courage.

He never told anybody about the real story and maybe the burden of being alone with the secret started to eat him little by little.

 _Maybe if I told somebody, it will go away?_

" _Are you that stupid to receive task after task to be in a dangerous situation with a criminal before, without noticing me of your problem?"_

He blinked, remembering Voight's rage before. What if this was going to be a problem in his future job? What if Voight thought he wasn't fit enough to be in Intelligence anymore? And what if they wanted him to have a full check-up – physically and mentally – and dismissed him from the Unit after that. Because right now, he didn't even know his own medical status of these whole nightmares and panic attack - if it was just a mild problem or a bad one.

"It was my dad."

Voight looked up from his coffee as he heard that, trying to figure out of what was happening. He could see how much Jay was struggling to keep talking. So he just remained silent – waiting patiently of whatever he was offered.

"My dad, he was once an alcoholic. I was like fifteen at that time, Will was seventeen." Voight leaned back, copying Jay's posture as the kid continued.

"One night, Will went out partying, leaving me alone with mom and dad. My mom was sick, it was a start that lead to her illness but I didn't know that at that time. Dad spent so much on booze he never cared about us for the whole year. I felt so angry because he didn't buy any medicine for mom. So I took his money but he knew." Jay's face contorted in pain at the memory – matching his quivering voice. "He beat me up so bad and left me alone in the kitchen." He went dead silent for a while.

" _Ungrateful son! If I knew you're going to be a thief, I should dump you long time ago!"_

 _The odour of alcohol hit his scent as he was being lift up by two big hands that grabbed his shirt, throwing him hard to the kitchen cabinet. He cringed as his forehead knocked the edge of the furniture – feeling dizzy all of the sudden._

 _1…_

 _That was when the first kick started._

Voight's arm reached his shoulder, squeezing it a little – pulling him back from the memory.

"You don't have to talk about this yet, if you're not ready." The grudge voice sounded surprisingly soothing for him to continue.

"No. It's… It's fine." He sighed, "Mom found me and I ended up in the hospital for two weeks. Unfortunately, dad was drunk enough and didn't remember any of that. Mom also kept silent about it and had me to do the same. We made up some story about a thief who never get caught. Will never knew about this and since mom died, she left me alone with the secret." Jay groaned, rubbing his temple hard. Thinking and talking about this really took a toll on his body. Even the drowsiness of the drugs before couldn't stop the new ache in his brain right now.

Voight scratched his left brow as he studied worriedly at the young man before him. He knew some part of the story as it was stated in his personal file – specifically in his medical history report – but that just it. He wanted to ask further but Jay was in no state to be put under more pressure. So he stood up, moving around the table to grab Jay's left arm.

"I think that's enough for tonight. Let's go, I'll help you."

"No." With what was left in his body, Jay pulled back his arm, ignoring the man beside him. His left hand was once again rubbing his aching temple – elbowing the table for some support.

"The nightmare, it's not what you're thinking it is."

Voight shook his head in disbelieved. _So this is what it's all about._

He moved back to his own chair, clearing his throat before asking, "Your nightmare, how often it is?"

Jay raised his brows, feeling grateful of the interest by his leader. At least he was all ears. "Not… not that often. The first time I got it, after I was being held captive by a group of enemies back in my army days. I have it for a week after being rescued. But then it went away. Just like that. And the second time was…." Jay halted, stealing a gaze to his boss before looking away. There was a hint of regret on his face.

Voight got the answer right away. "When you were already in my team."

Jay nodded. His looked so worried, thinking about his position in the unit. "I'm sorry for not telling you but you don't have to worry about it. I'm pretty sure it's not PTSD. It will not interfere my job at all."

Voight sighed. "It's not for you to decide either it is PTSD or not or how bad it is. If there's nothing to worry about, trust me I'll keep you in my team forever. But believe me kid, I saw a lot of friends who got lost under the influence of this illness. If you never get treated, sometimes things that happened 30, 40 years ago could still hunt you down until you give up. And we don't even start talking about this panic attack yet."

"But…" Jay leaned back, shoulders slumping down as Voight could see that he was no longer had his defense. The kid was at the verge of breaking down.

He was giving up.

"Jay, we can solve this. Off the book, I will help you." Voight nodded. "I will help you."

The kid was too out of it to think straight. He could see how Jay kept fighting his drugs, as he became exhausted minute by minute. So he thought it was really enough. Jay needed his rest and he was not going to accept any disagreement about that anymore.

Once again, he stood up, reaching for Jay's left arm and held on to it firmly this time – plainly didn't left any room for argument. "Let go get some rest."

Jay was standing up slowly in defeat. He swayed a little as he did so – feeling gratitude toward Voight's helping hands – or else he would knocked his injured ribs to the table.

They walked to the room and Voight never left his side alone – which he was so thankful. He eyed the older guy silently, wondering how tonight he put a lot of trust into this man without any doubt. Along his two years in Intelligence, he couldn't even count anymore how much time they had an argument over Voight's decisions to play things off the book.

But now he understood. All these times, Hank Voight just tried to protect every single one of their team – Tony, Al, Kevin, Ruzek, Erin, Mouse.

Him.

It was a new knowledge about this man – which earned him a new level of respect.

A new knowledge he paid with a secret. And it worth it.

Voight waited until Jay was settled down on Justin's bed. He was about to walk away when Jay called his name quietly, "Hey Voight… " He turned around, looking at the groggy eyes.

"Can I say thank you?"

His brows creased, trying to figure out how the young man's mind was working – but he answered anyway.

"Of course kid. You are welcome." Patting Jay's arm slowly – who didn't show any sign of waking up anymore – before he turned to the door.

He leaned over to the door frame, looking at the sleeping figure for the last time – just to make sure that everything was fine – before shutting the door slowly and continued back to the kitchen. He had some dishes to do but before that, he took out his phone from his pocket and scrolled down the names before touching the green button.

After two rings, the call was answered.

"Hi Voight. Is everything okay with Jay?" Will's voice was heard at the end of the line.

"Everything is fine. I just want to let you know that he is staying with me for the whole weekend."

After a few minutes, he put the phone back into his pocket. Taking a long look into the direction of Justin's room, his mind was determined.

He got work to do.

 **The End**

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 **Bad ending. Bad everything. I'm not satisfied but I need to end this. I'm so sorry if you expect more or better than this, this is my limit :( My biggest challenge was to write them stay in character. Hopefully, you still can leave some nice review about this. Also, for the people who asked me to write more chapter of this, I'm afraid I can't do that because I have a bad record of abandoning my stories (if I encounter the writer's block). One shot suits me better. There, my first CPD fanfic. Hopefully I'll have time to write more in the future. Thank you readers.**


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